


Blackbird in a Gilded Cage

by orphan_account



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Era, F/M, Incestuous feelings, Jealousy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-29
Updated: 2012-09-29
Packaged: 2017-11-15 06:37:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/524202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for this KMM prompt: <i>Arthur/Morgana. She sleeps in his bed during her short reign. The sheets still smell of him. </i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Blackbird in a Gilded Cage

She looks at her father, chained up in his own dungeon. The once mighty king has aged decades in the days he has been their prisoner.

"Why did you never tell me? I was raised to believe I would be his queen, only to find that I'm his _sister_!"

He does not answer, and she strikes him with the back of her hand.

*

She first meets Arthur when she is ten and he is nine. She is a stick-thin tomboy with cropped black hair. She had cut it herself, with her dagger, on the eve of her mother's funeral. He is a stout, flaxen-haired brat. For the first week or so, Arthur is under the impression that she is a boy and they fight constantly.

A month into their acquaintance, she slips away at night. Saddles her pony and makes a bid for freedom. He follows her, and when they are found he takes the blame, saying that they were on their way to kill dragons. Their wary friendship lasts until she reaches puberty and a shameful rusty-red spot on her underwear destroys her hopes of ever becoming a knight.

As time goes by, she learns that she has other weapons than swords and daggers. Her face and her figure can buy her almost anything, except the right to live her life as she sees fit. She learns that one day she will exchange this gilded cage for another, to be the wife of a man as dull and stern as Uther.

She does not know who plants the idea, but the thought of Arthur and she marrying creeps into their consciousness gradually. It makes sense to her. They know each other, and for all of Arthur's faults, he will let her help him with ruling the kingdom. He will give her a measure of freedom most men would not. He would never hit her and would never keep her constantly pregnant.

She is not in love with him. She has always fought him, always spurred him to be better. She has laughed at him and pulled him down a peg when his head got too big. In her own way, she is devoted to him. 

Some nights she wonders how his hands would feel in her secret places, how his weight would feel on top of her. After such nights, his gaze makes her blush. Arthur. Maddening, stupid, sincere, vain, impossibly brave _Arthur_.

She loses him to a starry-eyed urchin with over-large ears. 

Suddenly she - daughter of a duke and the King's ward - has to play second fiddle to the bastard son of a peasant woman. And to Gwen, the only person she has ever dared open her heart to. Because Gwen would make a convenient wife. She would turn a blind eye to her husband's dalliances, as Morgana would not.

It is Morgause who teaches her that women can be strong and brave. Morgause, who fights like a man and is both wise and learned. Morgause, who will never betray her. Morgause, who tasks herself with bringing down a kingdom for Morgana's sake. Morgana wonders what has she ever done to deserve such love. She, who has never been loved before in her life.

And yet she sleeps in Arthur's bed during those few, short nights of her reign. Gathers the bedding about her and buries her face in his smell, thoughts of his hot body and his strength coming to her unbidden.

She decides that if she cannot have him, she will make sure no-one else gets him, either.


End file.
